Not Peter Jackson’s Narnia

So I went to see Narnia last night, and I have to say, I was sorely disappointed. I was not disappointed primarily because I had high expectations, but because I think the film fails on many levels. I know I’ll probably get fried for giving it a poor review, but hey, what’s life without a little honesty? :D

WHY I DIDN’T LIKE THE NARNIA MOVIE

1. Sloppy CG

I’m sorry, but some of the backdrops and vistas were just so 1980’s computer graphics that I had to roll my eyes. When they first look over the valley of Narnia, rather than being a breathtaking vista, it looks like a bland inspirational greeting card. And when the camera pans back to them, the background looks like a cheap forest backdrop from a 1960’s film – I expected Errol Flynn to pop out any second. You can even see the green screen artifacts around their heads. Awful.

Also, some of the animals in the battle scene don’t move naturally enough – they kind of galumph awkwardly, and they cover more ground with each stride than their stride warrants, giving that flying effect. That would have been acceptable five years ago, but not now.

2. Narnia Feels Too Small

When Edmund sneaks away to the White Witch’s castle, he leaves his coat behind, but thank God it seems that it’s only a 10 minute walk from their location. I mean, not only did it seem like not much of a journey, but we don’t see any lands or living quarters for the Queen’s minions. Also, her castle seems small too – no grand rooms, intricate passageways, etc. The prison seemed to have two rooms – one for Tumnus, and one for Edmund.

This is one of the reasons why I call this "not Peter Jackson’s" – he knew how to create the feeling of epic scale – not just through big battle scenes or an occasional vista view, but through making buildings and varying landscapes for each scene. The lack of varied landscapes and largeness and creativity in individual scenes made this feel low budget.

3. No Background on the Deep Magic and Prophecies

The beaver mentions the prophecies, but not much more of the mythos behind them is developed. Despite the fact that this may not have been developed in the book, the lack of any more information here just made the prophecies seem contrived.

This lack of information was carried through to the stone table. I mean, the resurrection of Aslan gets a cursory mention of the Deep Magic and the writings surrounding it – a perfect chance to develop a deeper mythos, instead of a sloppy, superficial, Deus-Ex Machina reference to the Queen’s misreading of the text.

4. Aslan is Too Small and Unimpressive

I’m sorry, but Aslan was just not impressive enough with his diminutive size. When I read the book, I pictured him at about twice the size he was in the movie. Not only that, Liam Neeson’s voice was OK, but they needed to add just a little more depth and effect to it – he needed a more booming, scary voice.

In fact, the fear and awe of him that the book portrays did not come through in the movie – his size, and lack of ferociousness, and his predictable niceness made him seem like a nice kitty that even the queen could take for granted. Shame on Walden media for making him seem like a pussy (cat ;).

5. The Resurrection Scene – Boring, and A Missed Opportunity for CG

Aslan’s resurrection is so anticlimactic, I had to roll my eyes again. I mean, there is the earthquake, the splitting of the stone table, and the resurrection of the Lion, but all we get to hear is a rumble, and all we get to see is the girl’s surprise?!? How cool would it have been to see his carcass rise up in the air and do some cool sparkly stuff, and to see some invisible force smash the table at the same time? What should have been a climactic moment seemed like another low budget after-school special. I can just hear the discussion at the CG studio.

"Hey, this scene begs for some effects."

"Sorry, we spent all of our money on the big battle scene."

6. Little Character Development = Nobody Cares About Them

Despite the attempt to establish the characters, they just did not spend enough time developing them, and as a result, I did not care what happened to them. The only one with barely enough depth and humanity was Edmund, who at least showed a range of emotion. And while Lucy was charming and cute, she hadn’t suffered enough peril to show any depth of emotion.

And speaking of that, the whole crying scene at the stone table was contrived – rather than feeling real, I felt like they were trying to look upset while crying over a big stuffed animal. The fact that Aslan’s character was poorly developed meaned I didn’t care about him much either, despite the fact that he was Jesus’ analog.

7. Peter as a Warrior King? Not.

Lastly, the movie did not really establish why everyone would esteem Peter as a leader. He was so green it was palpable, and his few days of swordplay hardly seemed like enough time for him to be any kind of match for the Queen. And while it was obvious she was playing with him in their swordfight, he still seemed like a little boy in a King’s outfit.

I mean, take Luke Skywalker. He had to have a long period of training, and also had to enlist the help of the mystical force. That made his fighting abilities seem real. Even if Peter had no time to learn beyond a couple of days, some mystical intervention would have made his leadership believable.

And along the lines of not establishing the mythos, how is it that you can have two kings and two queens, none of whom are married to one another? Doesn’t that seem strange? They should explain such an anomaly.

8. Conclusion: A Story for 10 Year-Olds

The only people I see buying this DVD are Christians who need more family friendly videos to go along with their Veggie Tales collection. This movie is not epic, but rather, a poor screenplay adaptation of a timeless, classic allegory, aimed at pre-teens who need a story that is not too scary, and is bible-friendly.

Maybe, like the Harry Potter movies, which do a much better job at making their characters lovable, and at presenting a believable, interesting mythos, the series will get darker and more serious, and thereby more powerful and interesting, but my hopes are not up after this trip.

7 Responses

Ouch! The thing is that I agree with a lot (not all) of what you said, but saw them as smaller details that did not warrant the downgrading that you gave the movie. CG – I noticed one bad scene, but as I said there was a scene exactly like it only worse in The Two Towers. I think most of the energy was focused on Aslan and to me, his eyes were what clinched it. They were fantastic. Too Small- This I agree with you on to some extent. You lose a sense of the wonderment because Narnia seems like it is in a wardrobe to some extent. I think the comparrison to Lord of the Rings is unfair because LOTR was in a large extent about the landscape. Lewis was not as concerned about the grandiose of the land as Tolkien. No Background – I'm not sure how much background you could add to the movie without extending the length considerably. Again you have to remember Narnia was written for a different audience than LOTR and the movies are targeted at a different audience. Not many kids are going to sit through 30 minutes of development of prophecy and Deep Magic (or even character development, which is lacking in LOTR as well, especially the first one). Aslan's size – This I do agree with you on. They didn't make Aslan nearly as impressive as he should have been. The books talk about him being bigger than ordinary lions but that doesn't come across in the film. Resurrection – I could not disagree with you more. I would have hated some big cheesy, sparkly special effects driven resurrection. That was not meant to be the point. I can't see Jesus being resurrected with pixy dust flying around. Character Development – Again, I think you have to look at the audience and the time frame. 18-35 year olds will sit through some character development, but 8-17 year olds won't for the most part. I would have liked to see the characters fleshed out more, but the movie really wasn't made for me. Peter – That is the whole point. He does not feel like a warrior king because he doesn't believe he is one until late in the movie/book. Again, I disagree that the answer would be to through some "magic" on it. He struggles in his first attempt at leading an army as any one would especially a boy his age. It would not have been believable at all (or true to the book in any way), if Aslan zaps him with lion power and suddenly he can fight off dozens of animals at once. I don't know anyone (else) that even thought about questioning why there was two kings and two queens without any being married. It is just the established way in Narnia. Conclusion – You nailed it. It is a story for 10-year-olds, which is why it is unfair (I think) for us to insist that it fit our ideas of what it should be for us adults. It is also unfair to compare it to LOTR because they were totally different books and totally different films as a result. I guess it's all in how you look at it. I saw and agreed with much of the same flaws you did and thought they did not take away from the film enough to be important. You saw the same ones and thought they detracted greatly from the experience. This is why art is truly a subjective thing. Thanks for posting your thoughts though, even if I disagree with them I enjoy reading them.

Well, as with many superb movies made by Pixar and Dreamworks, they should connect on both the child's and the adult's level. Sure, there's no comedy in these, which makes it easier to connect on both levels, but I think they should have aimed higher, at the Harry Potter age group and level, which admittedly, goes upwards age-wise with each more "terrifying" movie. And the fact that it is fantasy very much like LOTR means that, like it or not, it is going to be compared to LOTR. They should have spent another hour doing backstory and character development, IMO, should have spent more money on CG, and should have written better dialogue. And the movie was way too predictable, esp. with the magic healing potion healing Edmund. It was so predictable at that point, I was dizzy from rolling my eyes, and wanted to get up and leave. Besides the poorly done resurrection scene, there were few twists or surprises that could have taken us deeper into a more than superficial fantasy world, with races and strange and wonderful animals that we knew nothing about. This movie held little wonder for me, except I kept wondering if they would ever make a Christian themed movie that wasn't a representative of "here's how not to do this genre." Besides the Passion, I've yet to see a modern movie with a overt redemptive theme that is awe inspiring – I mean, since Braveheart. 8|

narnia is a good movie when characters enters into narnia. But it’s end is poor because in this movie they said that white witch is defeated by childrens but it is shown that white witch is defeated by aslan. if she had to defeat by aslan then why author creates much suspence about her death . She could die early also by aslan there is no need to involve childrens in it. Here they have to show that white witch is defeated by suzan,peter,edmund or lucy.

narnia is a good movie when characters enters into narnia. But it's end is poor because in this movie they said that white witch is defeated by childrens but it is shown that white witch is defeated by aslan. if she had to defeat by aslan then why author creates much suspence about her death . She could die early also by aslan there is no need to involve childrens in it. Here they have to show that white witch is defeated by suzan,peter,edmund or lucy.

I've yet to see a modern movie with a overt redemptive theme that is awe inspiring – I mean, since Braveheart. 8| Braveheart? Good battle scenes but NO way did it deserve the academy award. Patrick McGoohan had the best performance as King Edward, eclipsing Mel Gibson.

Well, I liked Narnia. I didnt expect it to be as epic as LOTR because, well, I didnt think the books were! And I got it FOR my kids. So I thought it did justice. Although my oldest dd was a bit upset about Aslan's size, I think it was only because I complained about it. And I totally agree about Liam Neeson's voice too. I think James Earl Jones would have been the better choice. I only hope the movies are less confusing than the books. I complain about the HP movies (even though I like them) because I am so very fond of the books. (Same goes for LOTR too, although I love the movies a LOT) With Narnia, I liked the books ok, but I really enjoyed the movie more. And Braveheart is one of my all time faves, even if I have to cover my eyes or ears at some points ;)